Chapter 2

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Using Financial
Statements and Budgets

Chapter Outline
Learning Goals

I. Mapping Out Your Financial Future

A. The Role of Financial Statements in Financial Planning

II. The Balance Sheet: How Much Are You Worth Today?
A. Assets: The Things You Own
B. Liabilities: The Money You Owe
C. Net Worth: A Measure of Your Financial Worth
D. Balance Sheet Format and Preparation
E. A Balance Sheet for Jeremy and Elisha McPherson

III. The Income and Expense Statement: What We Earn and Where It Goes
A. Income: Cash In
B. Expenses: Cash Out
C. Cash Surplus (or Deficit)
D. Preparing the Income and Expense Statement
E. An Income and Expense Statement for Jeremy and Elisha McPherson

IV. Using Your Personal Financial Statements

A. Keeping Good Records
1. Managing Your Financial Records
B. Tracking Financial Progress: Ratio Analysis
1. Balance Sheet Ratios
2. Income and Expense Statement Ratios

V. Cash In and Cash Out: Preparing and Using Budgets

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13 13
 A. The Budgeting Process
1. Estimating Income
2. Estimating Expenses
3. Finalizing the Cash Budget
B. Dealing with Deficits
C. A Cash Budget for Jeremy and Elisha McPherson
D. Using Your Budgets

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Part 1 — Foundations of Financial Planning Using Financial Statements and Budgets — Chapter 2

VI. The Time Value of Money: Putting a Dollar Value on Financial Goals
A. Future Value
1. Future Value of a Single Amount
2. Future Value of an Annuity
B. Present Value
1. Present Value of a Single Amount
2. Present Value of an Annuity
3. Other Applications of Present Value

Major Topics
We can achieve greater wealth and financial security through the systematic development and
implementation of well-defined financial plans and strategies. Certain life situations require
special consideration in our financial planning. Financial planners can help us attain our
financial goals, but should be chosen with care. Personal financial statements work together to
help us monitor and control our finances in order that we may attain our future financial goals
by revealing our current situation, showing us how we used our money over the past time
period, and providing a plan for expected future expenses. Time value of money calculations
allow us to put a dollar value on these future financial goals and thereby plan more effectively.
The major topics covered in this chapter include:

1. The importance of financial statements in the creation and evaluation of financial

plans.
2. Preparing and using the personal balance sheet to assess your current financial
situation.
3. The concept of solvency and personal net worth.
4. Preparing and using the personal income and expense statement to measure your
financial performance over a given time period.
5. The importance of keeping and organizing your records.
6. The use of financial ratios to track financial progress.
7. Developing a personal budget and using it to monitor and control progress toward
future financial goals.
8. How to deal with cash deficits.
9. The use of time value of money concepts in putting a dollar value on financial goals.

Key Concepts
Personal financial statements play an extremely important role in the financial planning
process. They can help in both setting goals and in monitoring progress toward goal
achievement to determine whether one is "on track." Budgeting and financial planning guide
future outlays. As such, they require projections of future needs, desires, and costs. Setting up
a specific set of forecasts is the basis for future success. The following phrases represent the
key concepts discussed in the chapter.

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Part 1 — Foundations of Financial Planning Using Financial Statements and Budgets — Chapter 2

1. Personal financial statements

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Part 1 — Foundations of Financial Planning Using Financial Statements and Budgets — Chapter 2

2. Balance sheet equation

3. Types of assets, including liquid assets, investments, and personal and real property
4. Fair market value
5. Liabilities, including current liabilities, open account credit obligations, and long-term
liabilities
6. Net worth and equity
7. Insolvency
8. Income
9. Expenses, including fixed and variable expenses
10. Cash basis
11. Cash surplus or deficit
12. Record keeping
13. Liquidity, solvency, savings, and debt service ratios
14. Ratio analysis of financial statements
15. Cash budgets
16. Estimating income
17. Estimating expenses
18. Monitoring and controlling actual expenses
19. Time value of money concepts and calculations
20. Income and expense statement
21. Budget control schedule
22. Future value
23. Compounding
24. Annuity
25. Present value
26. Discounting

Financial Planning Exercises

The following are solutions to problems at the end of the PFIN4 textbook chapter.

1. In this exercise, we assume that the individual uses the cash basis of accounting rather
than the accrual basis for reporting on the financial statements.

a. Rent paid is listed as an expense. For the year, his rent expense would be $16,200
($1,350 x 12) unless he has rent due, the amount of which would show up as a current
liability on his balance sheet.

b. The earrings should be shown on the balance sheet as an asset—personal property.

Although the earrings have not been paid for, by definition they are an asset owned by
Ralph. However, they should be listed at fair market value, which is probably less than
the price paid due to the high markup on jewelry. The $900 bill outstanding is listed as
a current liability on the balance sheet.

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Another document from Scribd.com that is
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marveling at the strength of his purpose which did not shun a theatrical
effect to insure its success, “return and give me your hand that I may
lead you to the spot where I wish you to stand.”
What could I do but obey? Tremulous with sympathy, but resolved, as
before, not to succumb to the allurement he was evidently preparing for
me, I yielded myself to his wishes and let him put me where he would in
the darkness of that small chamber. A click and—
You have guessed it. In the sudden burst of light, I saw before me in
glorious portraiture the vision of her with whom my mind was filled.
The idol of my thoughts was she, whose father had just asked me if I
could love her enough to marry her.

VII

I had never until now considered myself as a man of sentiment. Indeed, a

few hours before I would have scoffed at the thought that any surprise,
however dear, could have occasioned in me a display of emotion.
But that moment was too much for me. As the face and form of her
whom to see was to love, started into view before me with a vividness
almost of a living presence, springs were touched within my breast
which I had never known existed there, and my eyes moistened and my
heart leapt in thankfulness that the appeal of so exquisite a womanhood
had found response in my indifferent nature.
For in the portrait there was to be seen a sweetness drawn from deeper
sources than that which had bewitched me in the smile of the dancer: a
richness of promise in pose and look which satisfied the reason as well
as charmed the eye. I had not done ill in choosing such a one as this to
lavish love upon.
“Ha, my boy, what did I say?” The words came from my uncle and I felt
the pressure of his hand on my arm. “This is no common admiration I
see; it is something deeper, bigger. So you have forgotten the other
already? My little girl has put out all lesser lights.”
“There is no other. She is the one, she only.”
And I told him my story.
He listened, gaining strength with every word I uttered.
“So for a mere hope which might never have developed, you were ready
to give up a fortune,” was all he said.
“It was not that which troubled me,” was my reply, uttered in all candor.
“It was the thought that I must disappoint you in a matter you seem to
have taken to heart.”
“Yes, yes,” he muttered as if to himself.
And I stood wondering, lost in surprise at this change in his wishes and
asking myself over and over as I turned on the lights and helped him
back to his easy chair in the big room, what had occasioned this change,
and whether it would be a permanent one or pass with the possible
hallucinations of his present fevered condition.
To clear up this point and make sure that I should not be led to play the
fool in a situation of such unexpected difficulty, I ventured to ask him
what he wished me to do now—whether I should remain where I was or
go down and make my young cousin’s acquaintance.
“She seemed very happy,” I assured him. “Evidently she does not know
that you are upstairs and ill.”
“I do not want her to know it. Not till a half hour before supper-time.
Then she may come up. I will allow you to carry her this message; but
she must come up alone.”
“Shall I call Wealthy?” I asked, for his temporary excitement was fast
giving away to a renewed lassitude.
“She will come when you are gone. She must not know what has been
said here to-night. No one must know. Promise me, Quenton.”
“No one shall know.” I was as anxious as he for silence. How could I
face her, or return Edgar’s handshake if my secret were known to either?
“Go, then; Orpha will be wondering where you are. Naturally, she is
curious. If you ever win her love, be gentle with her. She is used to
gentleness.”
“If I ever win her love,” I returned with some solemnity, “I will
remember this hour and what I owe to you.”
He made a slight gesture and taking it for dismissal I turned to go.
But the sigh I heard drew me back.
“Is there nothing I can do for you before I go?”
“Keep him below if you have the wit to do it. I do not feel as if I could
see him to-night. But no hints; no cousinly innuendoes. Remember that
you have no knowledge of any displeasure I may feel. I can trust you?”
“Implicitly in this.”
He made another gesture and I opened the door.
“And don’t forget that I am to see Orpha half an hour before supper.” In
another moment he was on his feet. “How? What?” he cried, his face, his
voice, his whole appearance changed.
And I knew why. Edgar was in the hall; Edgar was coming our way and
in haste; he was almost running.
“Uncle!” was on his lips; and in another instant he was in the room. “I
heard you were ill,” he cried, passing by me without ceremony and
flinging himself on his knees at the sick man’s side.
I did not stay to mark the other’s reception of this outburst. There could
be but one. Loving Edgar as he did in spite of any displeasure he may
have felt he could not but yield to the charm of his voice and manner
never perhaps more fully exercised than now. I was myself affected by it
and from that moment understood why he had got such a hold on that
great heart and why any dereliction of his or fancied slight should have
produced such an overwhelming effect. To-morrow would see him the
favored heir again; and with this belief and in this mood I went below.

VIII

I have thought many times since that I was fortunate rather than
otherwise to have received this decided set-back to my hopes before I
came into the presence of my lovely young cousin. It at least served to
steady me and give to our first meeting a wholesome restraint which it
might have lacked if no shadowing doubt had fallen upon my spirits. As
it was, there was a moment of self-consciousness, as our hands touched,
which made the instant a thrilling one. That she should show surprise at
identifying me, her cousin from a far-off land, with a stranger who half
an hour before had held her gaze from the gallery above, was to be
expected. But any hope that her falling lids and tremulous smile meant
more than this was a folly of which I hope I was not guilty. Had I not just
seen Edgar under circumstances which showed the power he possessed
over the hearts of men? What then must it be over the hearts of women!
Orpha could not help but love him and I had been a madman to suppose
that even with the encouragement of her father I could dream for a
moment of supplanting him in her affections. To emphasize the effect of
this conclusion I recalled what I had heard said by one of the two
servant-maids who had had countless opportunities of seeing him and
Orpha together, “Oh, nobody could put our Mr. Edgar out” and calmed
myself into a decent composure of mind and manner, for which she
seemed grateful. Why, I did not dare ask myself.
A few minutes later we were whirling in the dance.
I will not dwell on that dance or on the many introductions which
followed. The welcome accorded me was a cordial one and had I been
free to make full use of my opportunities I might have made a more
lasting impression upon my uncle’s friends. But my mind was diverted
by my anxiety as to what was going on in the room above, and the
question of how soon, if at all, Edgar would reappear upon the scene. It
was sufficiently evident from the expression of those about me that his
absence had been noted, and I could not keep my eyes from the gallery
through which he must pass on his way down.
At last he came into view, but too far back in the gallery for me to
determine whether he came as conqueror or conquered from our uncle’s
room. Nor was I given a chance to form any immediate conclusion on
this important matter, though I passed him more than once in the dance
into which he had thrown himself with a fervor which might have most
any sentiment for its basis.
But fortune favored me later and in a way I was far from expecting.
Having some difficulty in finding my partner for the coming dance, I
strolled into one of the smaller rooms leading, as I knew, to a certain
favorite nook in the conservatory. On the wall at my left was a mirror
and chancing to glance that way, I paused and went no further.
For reflected there, from the hidden nook of which I have spoken, I saw
Edgar’s face and figure at a moment when the soul speaks rather than the
body, thus leaving its choicest secret no longer to surmise.
He was bending to assist a young lady to rise from the seat which they
had evidently been occupying together. But the courtesy was that of love
and of love at its highest pitch—love at the brink of fate, of loss, of
wordless despair. There was no mistaking his look, the grasp of his hand,
the trembling of his whole body; and as I muttered to myself, “This is a
farewell,” my heart stood still in my breast and my mind lost itself for
the instant in infinite confusion.
For the lady was not Orpha, but a tall superb brunette whose
countenance was a mirror of his in its tenderness and desolation. Was
this the cause of Uncle’s sudden reversal of opinion as to the desirability
of a union between the two cousins? Had some unexpected discovery of
the state of Edgar’s feelings towards another woman, wrought such a
change in his own that he could ask me, me, whether I could love his
daughter warmly enough to marry her? If so, I could easily understand
the passion with which he had watched the effect of this question upon
the only other man whom his pride of blood would allow him to consider
as the heir of his hard gotten fortune.
All this was plain enough to me now, but what drove me backward from
that mirror and into a spot where I could regain some hold upon myself
was the certainty which these conclusions brought of the end of my
hopes.
For the scene of which I had just been the inadvertent witness was one of
renunciation. Edgar had yielded to his uncle’s exactions and if I were not
mistaken in him as well as in my uncle, the announcement would yet be
made for which this ball had been given.
How was I to bear it knowing what I did and loving her as I did! How
were any of us to endure a situation which left a sting in every heart? It
was for Orpha only to dance on untroubled. She had seen nothing—
heard nothing to disturb her joy. Might never hear or see anything if we
were all true to her and conscientiously masked our unhappiness and
despair. Edgar would play his part,—would have to with Uncle’s eye
upon him; and Uncle himself—
This inner mention of his name brought me up standing. I owed a duty to
that uncle. He had entrusted me with a message. The time to deliver it
had come. Orpha must be told and at once that her father wished to see
her in his room upstairs. For what purpose he had not said nor was it for
me to conjecture. All that I had to do was to fulfill his request. I was glad
that I had no choice in the matter.
Leaving my quiet corner I reëntered the court where the dance was at its
height. Round and round in a mystic circle the joyous couples swept, to a
tune entrancing in melody and rhythm. From their midst the fountain
sent up its spray of dazzling drops a-glitter with the colors flashed upon
them from the half hidden lights overhead. A fairy scene to the eye of
untroubled youth; but to me a maddening one, masking the grief of many
hearts with its show of pleasure.
What Orpha thought of me as I finally came upon her at the end of the
dance, I have often wondered. She appeared startled, possibly because I
was looking anything but natural myself. But she smiled in response to
my greeting, only to grow sober again, as I quietly informed her that her
father was a trifle indisposed and would be glad to see her for a few
minutes in his own room.
“Papa, ill? I don’t understand,” she murmured. “He is never ill.” Then
suddenly, “Where is Edgar?”
The question as she uttered it struck me keenly. However I managed to
reply in a purposely careless tone:
“In the library, I think, where they are practicing some new steps. Shall I
take you to him?”
She shook her head, but accepted my arm after a show of hesitation quite
unconscious I was sure. “No, I will go right up.”
Without further words I led her to the foot of the great staircase. As she
withdrew her arm from mine she turned her face towards me. Its look of
trouble smote sorely on my heart.
“Shall I go up with you?” I asked.
She shook her head as before, and with a strange wavering smile I found
it hard to interpret, sped lightly upward.
A few minutes later I had located my missing partner and was dancing
with seeming gayety; but almost lost my step as Edgar brushed by me
with a girl whom I had not seen before on his arm. He was as pale as a
man well could be who was not ill and though his lips wore a forced
smile the girl was doing all the talking.
What was in the air? What would the next half hour bring to him—to me
—to all of us?
I tried to do my duty by my partner, but it was not easy and I hardly
think she carried away a very favorable impression of me. When
released, I sought to hide myself behind a wall of flowering shrubs as
near the foot of the stairs as possible. Much can be read from the human
countenance, and if I could catch a glimpse of Orpha’s face as she
rejoined her guests, some of my doubts might be confirmed or, as I
secretly hoped, eliminated.
That Edgar had the same idea was soon apparent; for the first figure I
saw approaching the stairs was his, and while he did not go up, he took
his stand where he would be sure to see her the moment she became
visible in the gallery.
There was, however, a reason for this, aside from any personal anxiety
he may have had. They two, as acting host and hostess, were to lead the
procession to the supper-room.
I was to take in a Miss Barton and while I kept this young lady in sight, I
remained where I was, watching Edgar and those empty stairs for the
coming of that fairy figure whose aspect might reveal my future fate.
Nothing could be so important as this hoped-for freeing of my mind from
its heavy doubts.
Fortunately I had not long to wait. She presently appeared, and with my
first view of her face, doubt became certainty in my bewildered mind.
For she came with a joyful rush, and there was but one thing which could
so wing her feet and give such breeziness to her every movement. The
desire of her heart was still hers. Nothing that her father had said had
robbed her of that. Then as Edgar advanced, I perceived that her feelings
were complex and quite evenly balanced between opposite emotions.
Happiness lay before her, but so did trouble, and I could not feel at ease
until I knew just what this trouble was. Then I remembered; she had
found her father ill. That was certainly enough to account for the secret
care battling with her joy. And so all was clear again to my mind. But not
to my heart. For by the way Edgar received her and the quiet manner in
which they interchanged a few words, I saw that they understood each
other. That was what disturbed me and gave to my hopes their final blow.
They understood each other.
Whenever I think of the next half hour it is with astonishment that I can
remember so little of it. I probably spoke and answered questions and
conducted myself on the whole as a gentleman is expected to do on a
festive occasion. But I have no memory of it—none whatever. When I
came to myself, the supper was half over and the merriment, to which I
had probably added my full quota, at its height. With quick glances here
and there I took in the whole situation, and from that moment on was
quite conscious of how frequently my attention wandered from my
ingenuous little partner to where Orpha sat with Edgar, lovely as youth
and happiness could make her, but with never a look for me, much as I
longed for it.
That he should fail to see and appreciate this loveliness, was no longer a
matter of surprise to me who had seen him under the complete
domination of his secret passion for Miss Colfax. But the fear that others
might note it and wonder, was strong within me. For while he offered her
no slight, his glances like mine would seek the face of the woman he
loved, who to my amazement occupied the seat at his right. What a
juxtaposition for him! But she did not seem to be affected by it, but
chatted and smiled with a composure startling to see in one who to my
unhappy knowledge had just passed through one of the really great crises
in life. How could she look just that way, smile just that way, with a
breaking heart beneath her silks and laces? It was incomprehensible to
me till I suddenly awoke to the fact that I was smiling too and quite
broadly at some remark made by my friendly little partner.
Meantime the moment was approaching which I was anticipating with so
much dread. If the announcement of Edgar and Orpha’s engagement was
to be made, it would be during, or immediately after, the dessert and that
was on the point of being served. Edgar, I could see was nerving himself
for the ordeal, and as Orpha’s eyes sought her plate, I prepared myself to
hear what would end my evanescent dream and take away all charm
from life.

IX

“Friends!”
Was that Edgar speaking? Surely this was not his voice I heard.
But it was. Through the mist which had suddenly clouded everything in
that long room, I could see him standing at his full height, with his glass
held high in hand.
The hush was instantaneous. This seemed to unnerve him for I saw a
drop or two of wine escape from that overfilled glass. But he quickly
recovered the gay sang-froid which habitually distinguished him, and
with the aspect and bearing which made him the most fascinating man I
had ever met, went on to say:
“I have a word to speak for my uncle who I am sorry to say is detained in
his room by a passing indisposition. First, he bids me extend to you his
hearty greetings and best wishes for your very good health.”
He drank—we all drank—and joy ran high.
“Secondly:”—a forced emphasis, for all his strong command over
himself breaking in upon the suavity of his tone, “he bids me say that
this bringing together of his best friends is in celebration of an event dear
to his heart and as he hopes of interest to yourselves. It is my pleasure,
good friends, to announce to you the engagement of my uncle’s ward,
Miss Colfax, to one whom you all know, Dr. Hunter. Harry, stand up. I
drink to your future happiness, and—hers.” Oh, that slight, slight pause!
Was I dreaming? Were we all dreaming? From the blank looks I espied
on every side, it was evident that the surprise was not confined to myself,
but was in the minds of every one present. Miss Colfax and Dr. Hunter!
when the understanding was that we were here in celebration of his own
engagement to Orpha! It took a full minute for the commotion to
subside, then the whole crowd rose, I with the rest, and glasses were
clinking and shouts of good feeling rising in merry chorus from one end
of the room to the other.
Dr. Hunter spoke in response and Orpha smiled and I believe I uttered
some words myself when they all looked my way; but there was no
reality in any of it for me; instead, I seemed to be isolated from the
whole scene, in a rush of joy and wonder; seeing everything as through a
mist and really hearing nothing but the pounding of my own heart
reiterating with every throb, “All is not over for me. There is yet hope!
There is yet hope!”
But a doubt which came all too soon for my comfort drove much of this
mist away. What if we had heard but half of what our young host had to
say? What if his next words were those which I for one most dreaded?
Uncle was too just and kind a man to exact so painful a service from one
he so deeply loved, without the intention of seeing him made happy in
the end. And what to his mind, could so insure that blessing as a final
union between the two most dear to him?
In secret trepidation I waited for the second and still more profound hush
which would follow another high lifting of the glass in Edgar’s hand. But
it did not come. The ceremony, or whatever you might call it, was over,
and Orpha sat there, beaming and serene and so far as appearances went,
free to be loved and courted.
And then it came to me with sudden and strong conviction that Uncle
would never have countenanced such a blow to my hopes (hopes which
he had himself roused as well as greatly encouraged)—without giving
me some warning that his mind had again changed. He did not love me,
—not with a hundredth part of the fervor with which he regarded Edgar
—but he respected our relationship and must, unless he were a very
different man from what I believed him to be, have an equal respect for
the attachment I had professed for his daughter. He had sent me no
warning, therefore I need fear no further move this night.
But to-morrow? Well, I would let to-morrow take care of itself. For this
night I would be happy; and under the inspiration of this resolve, I felt a
lightness of spirit which for the first time that evening allowed me to be
my full and natural self. Perhaps the grave almost inquiring look I
received from Orpha as chance brought us for a moment together gave
substance to this cheer. I did not understand it and I dared not give much
weight to it, but from that time on the hours dragged less slowly.
At four o’clock precisely we three stood in an empty parlor.
“Now for Father!” cried Orpha. And with a kindly good-night to Edgar
and an equally kindly one to me, she sped away and vanished upstairs
leaving Edgar and myself alone together for the first time that evening.
It was an awkward moment for us both. I had no means of knowing what
was in his mind and was equally ignorant of how much he knew of what
was in mine. One thing alone was evident. The excitement of doing a
difficult thing, possibly a heart-breaking thing, had ebbed with the
disappearance of Orpha. He looked five years older, and blind as I was to
his motives or the secret springs of the action which had left him a
desolate man, I could not but admire the nerve with which he had carried
off his bitter, self-sacrificing task. If he loved this stunning brunette as I
loved Orpha he had my sympathy, whatever his motives, for the manner
in which he had yielded her thus openly to another. But, by this time, I
knew him well enough to recognize his mercurial, joy-seeking nature. In
a month he would be the careless, happy-go-lucky fellow in whom
everybody delighted.
And Uncle? And Orpha? What of them? Reminded thus of other
sufferings than my own, I asked, with what calmness I could:
“Have you had any further news from upstairs? I thought our uncle
looked far from well when I saw him in the early evening.”
“Wealthy sent for a doctor. I have not heard his report,” was the
somewhat curt answer I received. “I am going up now,” he added. Then
with continued restraint in his manner, he looked me full in the face and
remarked, “Of course you know that you are to remain here till Uncle
considers himself well enough for you to go. You will explain the
situation to your firm. I am but repeating Uncle’s wishes.”
I nodded and he stepped to the foot of the stairs. But there he turned.
“If you will make yourself comfortable in your old room,” he said, “I
will see that you receive that report as soon as I know it myself.”
This ended our interview.

Fifteen minutes later Wealthy appeared at my door. She did not need to
speak for me to foresee that dark days confronted us. But what she said
was this:
“Miss Orpha is not to know the worst. Mr. Bartholomew is in no
immediate danger; but he will never be a strong man again.”

Of the next few days there is little to record. They might be called non-
betrayal days, leading nowhere unless it was to a growth of self-control
in us all which made for easier companionship and a more equable
feeling throughout the house.
Of the couple whose engagement had been thus publicly proclaimed, I
learned some further facts from Orpha, who showed no embarrassment
in speaking of them.
Miss Colfax had been a ward of my uncle from early childhood. She was
an orphan and an heiress in a small way, which in itself gave her but little
prestige. It was her beauty which distinguished her; that and a composed
nature of great dignity. Though much admired, especially by men, she
had none of the whims of an acknowledged belle. Amiable but decided,
she gave her lovers short shrift. She would have none of them until one
fine day the sole admirer who would not take no for an answer, renewed
his importunities with such spirit that she finally yielded, though not
with any show of passion or apparent loss of the dignity which was an
essential part of her.
“Yet,” Orpha confided to me, “I was more astonished than I can say
when Father told me on the night of the ball that the two were really
engaged and that it was his wish that a public acknowledgment of it
should be made at the supper-table. And I don’t understand it yet; for
Lucy never has shown any preference for Dr. Hunter. But she is a girl of
strong character and however this match may turn out you will never
know from her that it is not a perfect success.”
No word of herself or Edgar; no hint of any knowledge on her part of
what I felt to be the true explanation of Miss Colfax’s cold treatment of
her various lovers. Was this plain ignorance, or just the effort of a proud
heart to hide its own humiliation? If the former, what a story it told of
secret affections developing unseen and unknown in a circle of intimates
whose lives were supposed to be open as the day. I marveled at Edgar, I
marveled at Orpha, I marveled at Lucy Colfax. Then I gave a little
thought to myself and marveled that I, unsuspected by all, should have
been given an insight into a situation which placed me on a level with
those who thought their secret hidden. The day might come when this
knowledge would be of some importance to me. But till that day arrived,
it was for me to hold their secret sacred. Of that there could be no
question. So what I had to say in response to these cousinly confidences
left everything where it was. Those were days of non-betrayal, as I have
already remarked; and they remained so until Uncle was again on his feet
and the time seemed ripe for me to return to New York.
Convinced of this I sought an interview with him. Though constantly in
the house I had not seen him since that fateful night.
He received me kindly but with little enthusiasm, while I exerted all my
self-control to keep from showing by look or manner how shocked I was
at his changed appearance. He confronted me from his invalid’s chair, an
old man; he who a month ago, was regarded by all as a most notable
specimen of physical strength and brilliant mentality.

The blow which had thus laid low this veritable king of men must indeed
have been a heavy one. As I took in this fact more fully I questioned
whether I had been correct in ascribing it to nothing more serious than
the discovery, at the last minute, of Edgar’s passion for another woman
than Orpha.
But I kept these doubts to myself and studiously avoided betraying any
curiosity, anxious as I was to know how matters stood with him, what his
present feelings were towards Edgar and what they were towards myself.
That he had not sent for me during these days of serious illness, while his
door had been constantly open to Edgar, might not mean quite as much
as appeared. He was used to Edgar and quite unused to myself. Besides,
his special attendants, those whose business it was to care for him, would
be more likely to balk than assist the intrusion into his presence of one
who might consider himself as a possible rival to their old time favorite.
Unless it was Orpha.
But why should I except Orpha? Had I any reason whatever for doing
so? No; a thousand times, no. Yet—
I was still astonished at my own persistence in formulating in my mind
that word yet when my uncle spoke.
“You must pardon me, Quenton, for leaving it to you to remind me of
our relationship. I was too ill to see any other faces about me than those
to which I am accustomed. I could not bear—”
We were alone and as he hesitated, he, the strong man, I put out my hand
with a momentary show of my real feelings.
“I understand. No apologies from you, Uncle. You have allowed me to
remain in the house with you. That in itself showed a consideration for
which I am truly grateful. But the time has now come for me to return to
my work. You are better—”
But here he stopped me.
“You are right; I am better, but I am on the down grade, Quenton, I who
till now have never known one sick day. I shall need attendance—
companionship—a man at my side—some one to write my letters—to
keep track of my affairs—you or—or Edgar. I cannot have him here
always. His temperament is such that it would be almost impossible for
him to bear for any length of time the constraint of a sick room. Nor
would I impose too much of the same on you. I have a proposition to
make,” he proceeded with a drop in his tone which bespoke a sudden
access of feeling. “What do you say to an equal sharing of this duty,
pleasure or whatever you may call it; a week of attendance from each in
turn, the off week of either being one of complete freedom from all
obligations and to be spent wherever you or Edgar may wish so that it is
not in this house? I will make it all right for you in New York. Edgar will
not need my help.” Then as I hesitated to reply he added with a touch of
pride, “An unusual proceeding, no doubt, but I have always been master
of the unusual and in this case my heart and honor are both involved.”
He did not explain how or in what way, nor did I ask him, for I saw that
he had not finished with what he had to say, and I wished to hear all that
was in his mind.
“It will not be for long.” (How certain he was!) “Consequently, it will
not be hard for you to assure me that whether here or elsewhere, you will
not disturb the present condition of affairs by any revelation of purpose
or desire beyond the one common to you all to see me slip happily and as
easily as possible out of life. Cousins, do you hear? cousins all three,
whatever the temptation to overstep the mark; cousins, until I speak or
am dead.”
I rose, and advanced to his side. I even ventured to take him by the hand.
“You may rely on my honor,” I quietly assured him, glad to see his eye
brighten and a smile reminiscent of his old hearty gladness, brighten his
worn countenance.
What more was said is of no consequence to my story.

XI

During the weeks which followed we all, so far as I know, kept

scrupulously to the line of conduct so arbitrarily laid out for us. Surface
smiles; surface looks; surface courtesies. The only topic which called out
full sincerity on the part of any of us was my uncle’s steadily failing
health.
Edgar and I saw little of each other save at the week’s end and then only
for a passing moment. As the one entered the front door the other
stepped out. The automobile which brought the one carried away the
other. As we met, we invariably bowed and spoke. Sometimes we shook
hands and just as invariably exchanged glances of inquiry seemingly
casual, but in reality, penetrating.
I doubt if he ever saw anything in me to awaken his alarm. But I saw
much in him to awaken mine. Though the control he had over his
features was remarkable, it is easy for the discerning eye to mark the
difference between what is forced and what is spontaneous. The
restlessness of an uneasy heart was rapidly giving way in him to more
cheerful emotions. His mercurial nature was reasserting itself and the
charm he had for a short time lost was to be felt again in all he did and
said.
This was what I had expected to happen, but not so soon; and my heart
grew more and more heavy as the month advanced. The recurring breaks
in his courtship of Orpha, and the presence in his absence of a possible
rival with opportunities of unspoken devotion equal to his own, had
given zest to a situation somewhat too tame before. From indifference to
the game or to what he may have looked upon as such, he began to show
a growing interest in it. A great fortune linked with a woman he felt free
to court under his rival’s eyes did not look quite so undesirable after all.
I may have done him injustice. Jealousy is not apt to be fair. But, if I read
him aright, he was just the man to be swayed by the influences I have
mentioned, and loving Orpha as I did, I found it hard to maintain even a
show of equanimity at what was fast becoming for me a hopeless
mystery. It was during these days that the monotony of my thoughts was
broken by my hearing for the first time of the Presence said to haunt this
house. I do not think my uncle had meant me to receive any intimation of
it, at least, not yet. He may have given command and he may simply
have expressed a wish, or he may have trusted to the good sense of his
entourage to keep silence where speaking would do no good. But, let that
be as it may, I had come and gone through the house to this day without
an idea that its many wonders were not confined to its unusual
architecture, its sumptuous appointments and the almost baronial
character of its service and generous housekeeping, but extended to that
crowning glory of so many historic structures in my own country, of—I
will not say a ghost, but a presence, for by that name it was known and
sometimes spoken of not only where its influence was felt, but by the
gossips of the town, to the delight of the young and the disdain of the
old; for the supernatural makes small appeal to the American mind when
once it has entered into full acquaintanceship with the realities of life.
Personally I am not superstitious and I smiled when told of this
impalpable something which was neither seen nor heard but strangely
felt at odd times by one person or another moving about the halls. But it
was less a smile of disdain than of amusement, at the thought of this
special luxury imported from the old world being added to the many
others by which I was surrounded.
But the person telling me did not smile.
My introduction to this incongruous feature of a building purely modern
happened through an accident. I was coming up the stairs connecting the
second floor with the one on which my own room was situated when a
sudden noise quite sharp and arresting in one of the rooms below,
stopped me short and caused me to look back over my shoulder in what
was a perfectly natural way.
But it did not so strike Bliss the chauffeur who was passing the head of
the stairs on his way from Uncle’s room. He was comparatively a new
comer, having occupied his present position but a few months, and this
may have been the reason both for his curiosity and his lack of self-
control. Seeing me stop in this way, he took a step down, involuntarily
no doubt, and gurgled out:
“Did—did you feel it? They say that it catches you by the hair and—and
—just in this very spot.”
I stared up at him in amazement.
“Feel it? Feel what?” And joining him I surveyed him with some
attention to see if he were intoxicated.
He was not; only a little ashamed of himself; and drawing back to let me
pass, he stammered apologetically:
“Oh, nothing. Just nonsense, sir; girls will talk, you know, and they told
me some queer stories about—about—Will you excuse me, sir; I feel
like a fool talking to a man of—”
“Of what? Speak it.”
He looked behind him, and very carefully in the direction of the short
passage-way leading to Uncle’s room; then whispered:
“Ask the girls, Mr. Bartholomew, or—or—Miss Wealthy. They’ll tell
you.” And was gone before I could hold him back for another word.
And that night I did ask Miss Wealthy, as he called her; and she,
probably thinking that since I knew a little of this matter I might better
know more, told me all there was to tell about this childish superstition.
She had never had any experience herself with the thing—this is the way
she spoke of it,—but others had and so the gossip had got about. It did
no harm. It never kept any capable girl or man from working in the
house or from staying in it year after year, and it need not bother me.
It was then I smiled.

XII

I had some intention at the time of speaking to Uncle about this matter,
but I did not until the day he himself broached the subject. But that
comes later. I must first relate an occurrence of much more importance
which took place very soon after this interchange of words with Wealthy.
I was still in C——. Everything had been going on as usual and I
thought nothing of being summoned to my Uncle’s room one morning at
an earlier hour than usual. Nor did I especially notice any decided
change in him though he certainly looked a little brighter than he had the
day before.
Orpha was with him. She was sitting in the great bay window which
opened upon the lawn; he by the fireside where a few logs were
smouldering, the day being damp rather than cold.
He started and looked up with his kindly smile as I approached with the
morning papers, then spoke quickly:
“No reading this morning, Quenton. I have an errand for you. One which
only you can do to my satisfaction.” And thereupon he told me what it
was, and how it might take me some hours, as it could only be
accomplished in a town some fifty miles distant. “The car is ready,” said
he, “and I would be glad to have you take it now as I want you to be
home in time for dinner.”
I turned impulsively, casting one glance at Orpha.
“You may take Orpha.”
But she would not go. In a flurry of excitement and with every sign of
subdued agitation, she hurriedly rose and came our way.
“I cannot leave you, Father. I should worry every minute. Quenton will
pardon my discourtesy, but with him gone and Edgar not yet here my
place is with you.”
I could not dispute it, nor could he. With a smile half apologetic, half
grateful, he let me go, and the only consolation which the moment
brought me was the fact that her eyes were still on mine when I turned to
close the door.
But intoxicating as the pleasure would have been to have had her with
me during this hundred mile ride, my thoughts during that long flight
through a most uninteresting country, dwelt much less upon my
disappointment than on the purpose actuating my uncle in thus disposing
of my presence for so many hours on this especial day.
In itself, the errand was one of no importance. I knew enough of his
business affairs to be quite sure of that. Why, then, this long trip on a day
so unpropitious as to be positively forbidding?
The question agitated me all the way there and was not settled to my
mind at the hour of my return. Something had been going on in my
absence which he had thought it undesirable for me to witness. The proof
of this I saw in every face I met. Even the maids cast uneasy glances at
me whenever I chanced to run upon one of them in my passage through
the hall. It was different with Uncle. He wore a look of relief, for which
he gave no explanation then or later.
And Orpha? She was a riddle to me, too, that night. Abstracted by fits
and by fits interested and alert as though she sought to make up to me for
the many moments in which she hardly heard anything I said.
The tears were in her eyes more than once when she impulsively turned
my way. And no explanation followed, nor did she allude in any manner
to my ride or to what had taken place in my absence until we came to say
good-night, when she remarked:
“I don’t know why I feel so troubled and as if I must speak to some one
who loves my father. You have seen how much brighter he is to-night.
That makes me happy, but the cause worries me. Something strange
happened here to-day. Mr. Dunn, who has attended to papa’s law
business for years, came to see him shortly after you left. There was
nothing strange about that and we thought little of it till Clarke and
Wealthy were sent for to witness Father’s signature to what they insist
must have been a new will. You see they had gone through an experience
of this kind before. It must have been five years or so ago, and both feel
sure that to-day’s business is but a repetition of the former one. And a
new will at this time would be quite proper,” she went on, with her
glance turned carefully aside. “It is not that which has upset me and
upset them. It is that in an hour or so after Mr. Dunn left another lawyer
came in whom I know only by name; a Mr. Jackson, who is well thought
of, but whom I have never chanced to meet. He brought two clerks with
him and stayed quite a time with Father and when he was gone, Wealthy
came rushing into my room to tell me what Haines had heard one of the
clerks say to the other when going out of the front door. It was this.
‘Well, I call that mighty quick work, considering the size of his fortune.’
To which the other answered, ‘The instructions were minute; and all
written out in his own hand. He may be a sick man, but he knows what
he wants. A will in a thousand—’ Here the door shut and Haines heard
nothing more. But Quenton, what can it mean? Two lawyers and two
wills! Do you think father can be all right when he can do a thing like
that? It has frightened me and I don’t know whether or not I ought to tell
Dr. Cameron. What do you advise?”
I was as ignorant as herself as to our duty in a matter about which we
knew so little, but I certainly was not going to let her go to bed in this
disturbed condition of mind; so I said:
“You may trust your father to be all right in all that concerns business.
His mental powers are as great as ever. If we do not understand all he
does it is because we do not know what lies back of his action.” Then as
her face brightened, I added: “Edgar and I have often been surprised at
the clearness of his perceptions and the excellence of his judgment in all
matters which have come up since we have taken the place of his former
stenographers. For nearly a month we in turn have done his typewriting
and never has he faltered in his dictation or seemed to lack decision as to
what he wanted done. You may rest easy about his employing two
lawyers even in one day. With so many interests and such complicated
affairs to manipulate and care for I only wonder that he does not feel the
need of a dozen.”
A little quivering smile answered this; and it was the hardest thing I was
ever called upon to do, not to take her sweet, appealing figure in my
arms and comfort her as my heart prompted me to do.
“I hardly think Dr. Cameron would say any different. You can put the
question to him when he comes in.”
But when she had flitted from my side and disappeared in the hall above,
I asked myself with some misgiving whether in encouraging her in this
fashion, I had quite convinced myself of the naturalness of her father’s
conduct or of my own explanation of the same.
Had he not sent me out of the house and on a long enough trip to cover
the time likely to be consumed by these two visits I might not have
concerned myself beyond the obvious need of sustaining her in her
surprise and anxiety. For as I told her, his interests were large and he
must often feel the need of legal advice. But with this circumstance in
mind it was but natural for me to wonder what connection I had with this
matter. Lawyers! And two of them! One if not both of them there in
connection with a will! Was he indeed in full possession of his faculties?
Or was some strange event brooding in this house beyond my power to
discern?
Alas! I was not to know that day, nor for many, many others. What I was
to know was this. Why, I had frequently seen Martha and, yes, I will
admit it, Clarke—the hard-headed, unimaginative Clarke—always step
more quickly when they came to the flight of stairs leading to the third
floor.
I was on this flight myself that night and about half way up, when I was
stopped,—not by any unexpected sound as at the time before—but by a
prickle of my scalp and a sense of being pulled back by some unseen
hand. I shook the fancy off and rushed pell-mell to the top with a laugh
on my lips which however never reached my ears. Then reason
reasserted itself and I went straight on in the direction of my room, and
was just turning aside from Wealthy’s cosy corner when I saw the screen
which hemmed it in move aside and reveal her standing there.
She had seen me through a slit in the screen and for some purpose or
other showed a disposition to speak.
Of course, I paused to hear what she had to say.
It was nothing important in itself; but to her devotion everything was
important which had any connection with her sick master.
“It is late,” she said. “Clarke is out and I have been waiting for Mr.
Bartholomew’s bell. It does not ring. Would you mind—Oh, there it is,”
she cried, as a sharp tinkle sounded in our ears. “You will excuse me,
sir,” releasing me with a gesture of relief.
An episode of small moment and hardly worth relating; but it is part—a
final part, so far as I am concerned—of that day’s story.

XIII
The following one was less troublesome, and so was the next; then came
the week of my sojourn elsewhere and of Edgar’s dominance in the
house we all felt would soon be his own. Whether Orpha confided to him
her latest trouble I never heard. When his week was up and I replaced
him again in the daily care of our uncle, I sought to learn if help or
disappointment had come to her in my absence. But beyond a graver
bearing and a manifest determination not to be alone with me even for a
few moments in any of the rooms on the ground floor, I received no
answer to my question. Orpha could be very inscrutable when she liked.
It was during the seven happy days of this week that three rather
important conversations took place between Uncle and myself, portions
of which I now propose to relate. I will not try your patience by
repeating the preamble to any one of them or the after remarks. Just the
bits necessary to make this story of the three Edgars understandable.

Uncle is speaking.
“I have been criticised very severely by my lawyer and less openly but
fully as earnestly by both men and women of my acquaintance, for my
well-known determination to leave the main portion of my property to a
man—the man who is to marry my daughter. My answer has always
been that no woman should be trusted with the responsibilities and
conduct of very large interests. She has not the nerve, the experience, nor
the acquaintanceship with other large holders, requisite for conducting
affairs of wide scope successfully. She would have to employ an agent
which in this case would of course be her husband. Then why not give
him full control from the start?”
I was silent, what could I say?
“Quenton?”
His tone was so strange, so different from any I had ever heard pass his
lips, that I looked up at him in amazement. I was still more amazed when
I noted his aspect. His expression which until now had impressed me as
fundamentally stern however he might mask it with the smile of
sympathy or indulgence, had lost every attribute suggestive of strength
or domination. Gone the steady look of power which made his glance so
remarkable. Even the set of his lips had given way to a tremulous line
full of tenderness and indefinable sorrow.
“Quenton,” he repeated, “there are griefs and remembrances of which a
man never speaks until the sands of life are running low; and not even
then save for a purpose. I loved my wife.” My heart leaped. I knew from
his tone why he had understood me that night of the ball and taken
instantly and at its full value the love I had expressed for Orpha. “Orpha
was only two years old when her mother died. A babe with no memories
of what has made my life! For me, the wife of my youth lives yet. This
house which has been constructed so as to incorporate within its walls
the old inn where I first met her, is redolent of her presence. Her tread is
on the stairs. Her beauty makes more beautiful every object I have
bought of worth or value to adorn her dwelling-place. Yet were she really
living and I had no other inheritor, I should not consider that I was doing
right by her or right by the world to leave her in full possession of means
so hardly accumulated and interests so complicated and burdensome. She
was tested once with the temporary charge of my affairs and, poor
darling, broke under it. Orpha is her child. She has the same
temperament, the same gentleness, the same strictness of conscience, to
offend which is an active and all-absorbing pain. If this burden fell upon
her—”
When he had finished I wondered if he had ever spoken of his wife to
Edgar as he spoke of her to me that hour.

“You have heard the gossip about this house. Some one must have told
you of unaccountable sounds heard at odd moments on the stairs or
elsewhere—steps other than your own keeping pace with you as you
went up or down.”
“Yes, uncle, I have been told of this. I heard something of the kind once
myself.”
“You did? When?” The glance he shot at me was quick and searching.
I told him and for a long time he sat very still gazing with retrospective
eyes into the fire.
“More than that,” I whispered after a while, “I heard a cough. It came
from no one in sight. It sounded smothered. It seemed to come from the
wall at my left, but that was impossible of course.”
“Impossible, of course. The whole thing is foolishness—not to be
thought of for a moment. The harmless result of some defect in
carpentry. I smile when people speak of it. So do my servants. I keep
them all, you see.”
“Uncle, if this house needed a finishing touch to make it the most
romantic in the world, this suggestion of mystery supplies it.”
I shall never forget his quick bend forward or the long, long look he gave
me.
It emboldened me to ask almost seriously:
“Uncle, have you ever felt this presence yourself?”
He laughed a long, hearty, amused laugh, then a strange expression
crossed his face unlike any I had ever seen on it before. “There’s
romance in these old fancies,—romance,” he murmured—“romance.”
No lover’s voice could have been more tender; no poet’s eye more
dreamy.
I locked the remembrance away in my mind, for I doubted if I ever
should see him in just such a mood again.

“Your eyes are very often on Orpha’s picture. I do not wonder at it; so
are mine. It has a peculiar power to draw and then hold the attention. I
chose an artist of penetrating intelligence; one who believes in the soul
of his sitter and impresses you more with that than with the beauty of a
woman or the mind of a man. I wanted her painted thus. Shall I tell you
why? I think I will. It may steady you as it has steadied me and so serve
a double purpose. Wealth has its charms; it also has its temptations. To
keep me clean in the getting, the saving, and the spending, I had this
picture painted and hung where I could not fail to see it when sitting at
my desk. If a business proposition was presented to me which I could not
consider under that clear, direct gaze so like her mother’s, I knew what to
do with it. You will have the same guardianship. The souls of two
women will protect you from yourself; Orpha’s mother’s and Orpha’s
own.”
I felt a thrill. Something more than wealth, more even than love, was to
be my portion. The living of a clean life in sight of God and man.

XIV

This gave me a great lift for the time. He had not changed his mind, then.
He still meant me to marry Orpha; and some of the mystery of the last
lawyer’s visit was revealed. That connected with the one which preceded
it might rest. I needed to know nothing about that. The great question
had been answered; and I trod on air.
Meanwhile Uncle seemed better and life in the great house resumed
some of its usual formality. But this did not last. The time soon came
when it became evident to every eye that this man of infinite force was
rapidly losing his once strong hold on life. From rising at ten, it grew to
be noon before he would put foot to floor. Then three o’clock; then five;
then only in time to eat the dinner spread before him on a small table
near the fireplace. Then came the day when he refused to get up at all but
showed great pleasure at our presence in the room and even chatted with
us on every conceivable topic. Then came a period of great gloom when
all his strength was given to a mental struggle which soon absorbed all
his faculties and endangered his life. In vain we exerted ourselves to
distract him. He would smile at our sallies, appear to listen to his favorite
authors, ask for music—(Orpha could play the violin with touching
effect and Edgar had a voice which like all his other gifts was
exceptional) but not for long, nor to the point of real relief. While we
were hoping that we had at last secured his interest, he would turn his
head away and the struggle of his thoughts would recommence, all the
stronger and more unendurable because of this momentary break.
Orpha’s spirits were now at as low an ebb as his. She had sat for weeks
under the shadow of his going but now this shadow had entered her soul.
Her beauty once marked for its piquancy took on graver lines and moved
the hearts of all by its appeal. It was hard to look at her and keep back all
show of sympathy but such as was allowable between cousins engaged
in the mutual tasks which brought us together at a sick man’s bedside. If
the discipline was good for my too selfish nature, the suffering was real,
and in some of those trying hours I would have given all my chance in
life to know if Orpha realized the turmoil of mind and heart raging under
my quiet exterior.
Meantime, a change had been made in our arrangements. Edgar and I
were no longer allowed to leave town though we continued to keep
religiously to our practice of spending alternate weeks in attendance on
the invalid.
This, in these latter days included sleeping in the den opening off
Uncle’s room. The portrait of Orpha which had made this room a
hallowed one to me, had been removed from its wall and now hung in
glowing beauty between the two windows facing the street, and so in full
sight from Uncle’s bed. His desk also, with all its appurtenances had
been in a corner directly under his eye, and as I often noted, it was upon
one or other of these two objects his gaze remained fixed unless Orpha
was in the room, when he seemed to see nothing but her.
He had been under the care of a highly trained nurse during the more
violent stages of his illness, but he had found it so difficult to
accommodate himself to her presence and ministrations that she had
finally been replaced by Wealthy, who had herself been a professional
nurse before she came to Quenton Court. This he had insisted upon and
his will was law in that household. He ruled from his sick bed as
authoritatively as he had ever done from the head of his own table. But
so kindly that we would have yielded from love had we not done so from
a sense of propriety.
His gloom was at its height and his strength at its lowest ebb when an
experience befell me, the effects of which I was far from foreseeing at
the time.
Edgar’s week was up and the hour had come for me to take his place in
the sick room. Usually he was ready to leave before the evening was too
old for him to enjoy a few hours in less dismal surroundings. But this
evening I found him still chatting and in a most engaging way to our
seemingly delighted uncle, and taking the shrug he made at my
appearance as a signal that they were not yet ready for my presence, I
stepped back into the hall to wait till the story was finished which he was
relating with so much spirit.
It took a long time, and I was growing quite weary of my humiliating
position, when the door finally opened and he came out. With every
feature animated and head held high he was a picture of confident
manhood. This should not have displeased me and perhaps would not
have done so had I not caught, as I thought, a gleam of sinister meaning
in his eye quite startling from its rarity.
It also, to my prejudiced mind, tinged his smile, as slipping by me, he
remarked:
“I think I had the good fortune to amuse him to-night. He is asleep now
and I doubt if he wakes before dawn. Lower his light as you pass by his
bed. Poor old Uncle!”
I had no answer for this beyond a slight nod, at which, with an air I
found it difficult to dissociate with a sense of triumph, he uttered a short
good-night and flew past me down the stairs.
“He has won some unexpected boon from Uncle,” I muttered in dismay
as the sound of his footsteps died out in the great rooms below. “Is it
fortune? Is it Orpha?” I could bear the loss of the first. But Orpha?
Rather than yield her up I would struggle with every power with which I
had been endowed. I would—
But here I entered the room and coming under the direct influence of the
masterly portraiture of her who was so dear to me, better feelings
prevailed.
To see her happy should and must be my chief aim in life. If union with
myself would ensure her that and I came to know it, then it would be
time for me to exert my prowess and hold to my own in face of all
opposition. But if her heart was his—truly and irrevocably his, then my
very love should lead me to step aside and leave them to each other. For
that would be their right and one with which it would be presumptuous
in me to meddle.
The light which I had been told to extinguish was near my uncle’s hand
as he lay in bed.
Seeing that he was, as Edgar said, peacefully asleep, I carefully pulled
the chain attached to the flaming bulb.
Instantly the common-places of life vanished and the room was given
over to mystery and magic. All that was garish or simply plain to the
view was gone, for wherever there was light there were also shadows,
and shadows of that shifting and half-revealing kind which can only be
gotten by the fitful leaping of a few expiring flames on a hearth-stone.
Uncle’s fire never went out. Night or day there was always a blaze. It
was his company, he said, and never more so than when he woke in the
wee small hours with the moon shut out and silence through all the
house. It would be my task before I left him for the night to pile on fresh
fuel and put up the screen, which being made of glass, allowed the full
play of the dancing flames to be seen.
Reveling in the mystic sight, I drew up a chair and sat before Orpha’s
portrait. Edgar was below stairs and doubtless in her company. Why,
then, should I not have my hour with her here? The beauty of her
pictured countenance which was apparent enough by day, was well nigh
unearthly in the soft orange glow which vivified the brown of her hair
and heightened the expression of eye and lip, only to leave them again in
mystery as the flame died down and the shadows fell.
I could talk to her thus, and as I sat there looking and longing, words fell
from my lips which happily there was no one to hear. It was my hour of
delight snatched in an unguarded hour from the hands of Fate.
She herself might never listen, but this semblance of herself could not
choose but do so. In this presence I could urge my plea and exhaust
myself in loving speeches, and no displeasure could she show and even
at times must she smile as the shadows again shifted. It was a hollow
amends for many a dreary hour in which I got nothing but the same
sweet show of patience she gave to all about her. But a man welcomes
dream food if he can get no other and for a full hour I sat there talking to
my love and catching from time to time in my presumptuous fancy faint
whispers in response which were for no other ears than mine.
At last, fancy prevailed utterly, and rising, I flung out my arms in
inappeasable longing towards her image, when, simultaneously with this
action I felt my attention drawn irresistibly aside and my head turn
slowly and without my volition more and more away from her, as if in
response to some call at my back which I felt forced to heed.
Yet I had heard no sound and had no real expectation of seeing any one
behind me unless it was my uncle who had wakened and needed me.
And this was what had happened. In the shadow made by the curtains
hanging straight down from the head-board on either side of his bed, I
saw the gleam of two burning eye-balls. But did I? When I looked again
there was nothing to be seen there but the shadowy outlines of a sleeping
man. My fancy had betrayed me as in the hour of secret converse I had
just held with the lady of my dreams.
Yet anxious to be assured that I had made no mistake, I crossed over to
the bedside and, pushing aside the curtains, listened to his breathing. It
was far from equable, but there was every other evidence of his being
asleep. I had only imagined those burning eye-balls looking hungrily into
mine.
Startled, not so much by this freak of my imagination as by the effect
which it had had upon me, I left the bed and reluctantly sought my room.
But before entering it—while still on its threshold—I was again startled
at feeling my head turning automatically about under the uncanny
influence working upon me from behind, and wheeling quickly, I
searched with hasty glances the great room I was leaving for what thus
continued to disturb me.
Orpha’s picture—the great bed—the desk, pathetic to the eye from the
absence before it of its accompanying chair—books—tables—Orpha’s
pet rocker with the little stand beside it—each and every object to which
we had accustomed ourselves for many weeks, lit to the point of
weirdness, now brightly, now faintly and in spots by the dancing
firelight! But no one thing any more than before to account for the
emotion I felt. Yet I remember saying to myself as I softly closed my
door upon it all:
“Something impends!”
But what that something was, was very far from my thoughts as are all
spiritual upheavals when we are looking for material disaster.

I had been asleep, but how long I had no means of knowing, when with a
thrill such as seizes us at an unexpected summons, I found myself
leaning on my elbow and staring with fascinated if not apprehensive
gaze at the door leading into my uncle’s room left as I always left it on
retiring, slightly ajar.
I had heard no sound, I was conscious of no movement in my room or in
his, yet there I was looking—looking—and expecting—what? I had no
answer for this question and soon would not need one, for the line of
ruddy light running upward from the floor upon which my eyes were
fixed was slowly widening, and presently I should see whose hesitating
foot made these long pauses yet showed such determination to enter
where no foot should come thus stealthily on any errand.
Again! a furtive push and I caught the narrowest of glimpses into the
room beyond. At which a sudden thought came, piercing me like a dart.
Whoever this was, he must have crossed my uncle’s room to reach this
door—may have stood at the sick man’s side—may have—Fear seized
me and I sprang up alert but sank back in infinite astonishment and
dismay as the door finally swung in and I beheld dimly outlined in the
doorway the great frame of Uncle himself standing steadily and alone,
he, who for days now had hardly moved in his bed.
Ignorant of the cause which had impelled him to an action for which he
was so unfit; not even being able to judge in the darkness in which I lay
whether he was conscious of his movements or whether he was in that
dangerous state where any surprise or interference might cause in him a
fatal collapse, I assumed a semblance of sleep while covertly watching
him through half shut lids.
A moment thus, then I felt rather than saw his broad chest heave and his
shaking limbs move bringing him step by step to my side. Had he fallen
face downward on to my narrow couch I should not have wondered. But
he came painfully on and paused, his heart beating so that I could hear it
above my own though that was throbbing far louder than its wont.
Next moment he was on his knees, with his arms thrown over my breast
and clinging there in convulsive embrace as he whispered words such as
had never been uttered into my ears before; words of infinite affection
laden with self-reproaches it filled me with a great compassion to hear.
For I knew that these words were not meant for me; that he had been
misled by the events of the evening and believed it to be in Edgar’s ear
he was laying bare his soul.
“I cannot do it.” These were the words I heard. “I have tried to and the
struggle is killing me. Forgive me, Edgar, for thinking of punishing you
for what was the result of my own shortsighted affection.”

I stirred and started up. I had no right to listen further.

But his hold on me tightened till the pressure became almost
unendurable. The fever in his veins made him not only strong but
oblivious to all but the passion of the moment,—the desire to right
himself with the well-beloved one who was as a son to him.
“I should have known better.” Thus he went on. “I had risen through
hardship, but I would make it easy for my boy. Mistake! mistake! I see it
now. The other is the better man, but my old heart clings to its own and I
cannot go back on the love of many years. You must marry Orpha and
her gentle heart will—”
A sob, a sudden failing of his fictitious strength, and I was able to rise
and help him to rise, though he was almost a dead weight in my arms.
Should I be able alone and unassisted to guide him back to his bed
without his discovering the mistake he had made and thus shocking him
into delirium? The light was dim where we stood and rapidly failing in
the other room as the great log which had been blazing on the hearth-
stone crumbled into coals. Could I have spoken, the task might have
been an easier one; but my accent, always emphasized under agitation,
would have betrayed me.
Other means must be taken to reassure him and make him amenable to
my guidance. Remembering an action of Edgar’s which I had lately seen,
I drew the old man’s arm about my shoulder and led him back into his
room. He yielded easily. He had passed the limit of acute perception and
all his desire was for rest. With simple, little soothing touches, I got him
to his bed and saw his head sink gratefully into his pillow.
Much relieved and believing the paroxysm quite past, I was turning
softly away when he reached out his hand and, grasping me by the arm,
said with an authority as great as I had ever seen him display even on
important occasions:
“Another log, Edgar. The fire is low; it mustn’t go out. Whatever
happens, it must never go out.”
And he, burning up with fever!
Though this desire for heat or the cheer of the leaping blaze might be
regarded as one of the eccentricities of illness, it was with a strange and
doubtful feeling that I turned to obey him—a feeling which did not leave
me in the watchful hour which followed. Though I had much to brood
over of a more serious character than the mending or keeping up of a
fire, the sense of something lying back of this constant desire for heat
would come again and again to my mind mingling with the great theme
now filling my breast with turmoil and shaping out new channels for my
course in life. Mystery, though of the smallest, has a persistent prick. We
want to know, even if the matter is inconsequent.